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New Victoria Uprising
The New Victoria Uprisin'''g, also known as the '''New Victoria People's Rebellion by the New Comintern Pact, was a city-wide uprising which saw the city of New Victoria, the capital of Cascadia, be turned into a warzone where armed strikes fought a brutal urban war against the Cascadian Army from January 14th until March 1st, 2284 when the last of the forces surrendered. The uprising was caused by the Cascadian government's decision to use the military police to crack down on striking workers and after one was killed by accident, the strikers errupted into revolt and siezed all the weapons they could and took over much of the city. Chancellor Jerome Bennett and his cabinet were forced into hiding and the Cascadian Defense Forces were soon called in to supress the uprising and they did, but through brutal means and at a heavy cost and started the Cascadian Civil War. Background In 2278, Jerome Bennett was elected Chancellor of Cascadia and his political party, the New Prosperity Alliance, took over the Cascadian government. Upon taking power, Bennett began cracking down on dissent and leftist elements within Cascadia turning the Ministry of the Interior into his own secret police force. He would later introduce conscription and had thousands of Cascadians drafted into the army to fight against Caesar's Legion, but he unofficially helped create so-called "penal batallions" in the Cascadian Army, units comprised of conscripts with left-leaning views sent to the frontlines in dangerous conditions and suffer high casualty rates. Poor and working class citizens were commonly targeted by these policies while the rich were left untouched causing bitter resentment towards the upper class which culminated in the strike lead by Donovan Walker and Samuel Wakeman, leaders of the Worker's Union. Initial Strikes and Riots In the morning of January 14th, 2284, factories, mines, and the industrial sector of New Victoria found itself shut down as thousands of workers walked out in protest and staged a general strike. The strike was lead by Donovan Walker and Samuel Wakeman of the New Victoria Steel and Miner Workers' Union and the workers chose to strike in response to conscription that unfairly targeted working class men and women of Cascadia. Conscription had remained in law even after the end of the Cascadian Campaign which saw Cascadia and the New California Republic emege victorious and Caesar's Legion forced to retreat, but conscription was to be abolished once the conflict had ended and it remained in place. Police were sent in to contain the striking workers, but they convinced more workers across New Victoria to go on strike and many within the city joined due to them holdng sympathies with the union members. The New Victoria Police Department began recieving orders from the Cascadian Central Government and were ordered to stop the striking workers from reaching any government buildings, especially the Chancellor's Office and the Parliament Building and were to use force by any means necessary. Initially, the containment was successful, but riots broke out and the police and workers began clashing with each other. Eventually, one police officer took out his pistol and shot and killed one of the strikers. The shooting was an accident, but the other officers opened fire and ended with 14 protestors dead and more wounded. Since this happened in the center of the city, it was dubbed the Central Square Massacre and this caused the marchers to charge ahead and riot resulting in police officers being killed and their weapons were stolen to be used by the now armed rebels. Union Offensive By January 17th, the march turned into a full blown uprising and riot police were soon overrun when marchers and union members stormed their positions and sympathizers greatly hampered the police's ability to supress the uprising. Soon, the workers were armed and the police station would be stormed and taken by the workers and soon mobilized 2,000 people into "makeshift fighters", non-combatants organized into militia units to serve as reserves. When the Police Headquarters was taken, the city courthouse was stormed and captured, the stock market, many factories, including the weapons factory, and even the Supreme Court House, though the judges were evacuated before they could be held hostage. By the 22nd, the city was within the union's hands and the government evacuated to Vancouver where Chancellor Bennett would adress the nation on the situation unfolding in New Victoria. There, he announced his intention to negotiate with the rebels, but had sent the Cascadian Army to blockade the city and prevent the rebellion from spreading to the rest of Cascadia. While this was happening, Cascadian communists began mobilizing and prepared for their "grand assault" when the right time came. Before long, the union mobilized a militia in the thousands and armed all of them with weapons siezed from barracks, police stations, soldiers and cops who defected as well as from government checkpoints that were overrun. The unionists began to capture more and more of the city and managed to secure a perimeter surrounding the Parliament Building right in the center of the city. The goal was to cut it off and subject it to a siege and force the government to surrender. This was done since the chancellor and his cabinet had left and thus the chancellor's office was ignored due to it lacking any value in the yes of the militiamen. Battle for the Parliament By the end of January, a quarter of New Victoria was now occupied by the unionists with the rest of the city either falling under union influence or under army control, though such areas were being subjected to endless attacks and their defenders were undersupplied. The parliament building was surrounded and their only defenders were the so ldiers of the 14th Reserve Regiment lead by Colonel Michael Kruger. Army Intervention Union's Last Stand Aftermath and Effects The uprising was crushed and all surviving captured workers were imprisoned and their surviving leaders executed for treason. The uprising was a military victory for Cascadia, but was a psychological and propaganda victory for the workers as the Cascadian government under Jerome Bennett had unintentionally made itself out to be violent capitalist extremists and caused further riots all cross the nation. New Victoria sustained heavy damage and this was used by the New Comintern Pact to justify direct military intervention and mobilized all forces within the Northwest, Alberta, and Southern Fronts leading to the July Offensive once communist insurgents managed to capture enough areas to be used as staging points for the Comintern Pact's International People's Red Army. Category:Battles Category:Events